Josh Kopelman

Managing Director of First Round Capital.

espite being coastally challenged (currently living in Philadelphia), Josh has been an active entrepreneur and investor in the Internet industry since its commercialization. In 1992, while he was a student at the Wharton School of the University of Pennsylvania, Josh co-founded Infonautics Corporation – an Internet information company. In 1996, Infonautics went public on the NASDAQ stock exchange.

Monthly Archives for 2010

I had a blast at our Philadelphia Office Hours. My partners and I met with over 50 entrepreneurs at our biggest Office Hours yet. My favorite was being pitched by an entrepreneur who arrived directly from Penn's graduation, still in his cap and gown.

Well, we are hitting the road with Office Hours again. This time in San Francisco. Please join us for Office Hours in San Francisco on June 11th from Noon - 2PM PST. This event will mark two firsts for us.

And it will also be the first time that we hold Office Hours in, well, our office.

As with all of our Office Hours events, this is your opportunity to meet with the First Round Capital team and start a conversation about your start-up, your ideas, or yourself. While the meetings are brief, we've found they are a good way to start a dialog and build a relationship. We hope to see you at our office...

Over the last several months, First Round Capital has held our "Office Hours" events in San Francisco, New York City, Austin and Vancouver. Well, now it's time to bring it home! I'm super excited to announce our first Office Hours event here in Philadelphia. Please join us on Monday, May 18th from 3-5pm at World Cafe Live.

One of the greatest opportunities in college was Office Hours. Every
professor held them and suddenly became accessible. It was a few
minutes where you could walk-in, sit down, ask questions, develop a
relationship and catch a professor in an informal environment. We think
the same opportunity for dialogue should exist for entrepreneurs and
venture capitalists. At Office Hours, we'd love to meet with entrepreneurs, people
thinking about becoming entrepreneurs or folks who would like to join a
start-up. No agenda needed. No presentations or preparation required. Just an opportunity to discuss entrepreneurship and startups.

We've met with 50-60 entrepreneurs at every other city -- let's make Philadelphia our biggest event yet!

Last week the Wall Street Journal ran a story highlighting several entrepreneurs who are forgoing salary in order to keep their business alive. I’ve often believed that the true measure of an entrepreneur’s character comes not during the boom times, but how they react in times of adversity and challenge. Personally, I think I grew more as an entrepreneur during the years when Infonautics struggled (and the stock price languished) than I did during the Half.com rocketship. You learn a lot about yourself and the people around you when you’re in the foxhole and things aren’t looking good.

That’s why I’m so proud to have worked with Doug Camplejohn, Ofer Doitel, Roger Matus and Sean True. These entrepreneurs founded two First Round Capital companies - Mi5 Networks and Inboxer. These entrepreneurs experienced -- and overcame -- real adversity during their startup journey. These entrepreneurs went without salary at times, even investing personal capital to help their company meet payroll. These entrepreneurs all passionately believed in what they were building.

And last month their belief paid off, as these entrepreneurs succesfully led their companies to acquisitions. Doug and Ofer led Mi5 Networks to a sale to Symantec – a wonderful outcome for their team, their investors and their customers. And Roger and Sean led Inboxer to a sale to Safecore – allowing Inboxer’s employees, investors and customers to benefit from a much stronger platform.

I’m honored to have worked with all four of these men . They are true entrepreneurs. And I can only hope to have the opportunity to get back into the foxhole with them in their future ventures.